The 2020 Grammy nominations arrived today without Rapsody amongst them, and the North Carolina rapper reflected on her disappointment in an Instagram post shared with her fans. Although she was nominated for Laila’s Wisdom back in 2017, she missed the cut this year with her third album, Eve.
In her note, Rapsody thanked her supporters and shouted out Freddie Gibbs, whose Bandana album with Madlib also didn’t earn any nominations:
Thank you for the LOVE you award me. I see you. The ones who lend me your ear, words, support. Every time. I rarely, if ever, show my cards or that I’m human when it comes to my music career. Feel like opening up some today, tho. Today…..disappointed. Yes. Frustrated…beyond. But, you have to tell yourself the good fight is never an easy one. And the people that are the faces of the purpose behind your art are what makes creating not empty: with awards. nominations, or none at all. Not to hold you, the acknowledgment for your craft indeed feels amazing!! I haven’t been nominated for much but what I have I’m thankful for. There’s so much power and weight in numbers, nominations and awards….we artist know what that does for our exposure; and for the many, validation. And you want people to continue to discover and play and be inspired by the music. That’s what I get excited about anyway. But, hey….we keep on creating. [Freddie Gibbs] …you put out one of the best albums….to everyone nominated for anything congratulations….to all artist who create….keep the microphone, pens, visuals, instruments lit. Art is too important not to share. Mad love. ♥️
In addition to her Best Rap Album nod in 2017, she earned a Best Rap Song nomination that year for “Sassy.” She previously contributed to Kendrick Lamar’s 2015 Album of the Year-nominated album, To Pimp A Butterfly.
Eve dropped in August 2019, complete with features from GZA, Queen Latifah, JID, J. Cole, Leikeli47, and more. The project is an ode to black women, as she explained to BET earlier this year.
“I just wanted to represent all aspects of black women and all roles that we play,” she said. “Maya Angelou, one of my favorite poets, I have a song I wished really could have made it called ‘Assata Shakur’ because her story is so powerful and a lot of the younger kids and some of our older generation don’t even know who she is. Those are some of the women that I think that come to mind.”
Catch up on all the lyrics to Rapsody’s Eve on Genius now.
